By Dan Ambrose: Paulie Malignaggi thinks he should be the one that is fighting Marcos Maidana (34-3, 31 KO’s) this Saturday night, not WBA welterweight champion Adrien Broner (27-0, 22 KO’s) in their fight at the Alamodome, in San Antonio, Texas, USA. Malignaggi still thinks he was robbed of a decision in his 12 round split decision loss to Broner last June in Brooklyn, New York.
It was a close fight that could have gone either way, but Malignaggi is convinced that he did more than enough to have retained his WBA 147 lb. title, which he lost in that fight. Malignaggi now wants to fight the winner of the Broner-Maidana fight, and he feels that he deserves to fight the winner.
“They’re [Broner-Maidana] are fighting for the belt that belongs to me,” Malignaggi said to RingTV. “It shouldn’t have been me and Zab Judah…It should have been me and Marcos Maidana, because he was the mandatory for the WBA title. and I should still be the champion. The belt belongs to me.”
I’d prefer not to see Malignaggi inserted back into the picture to fight the Broner vs. Maidana. There needs to be some new blood mixed in. What we don’t want is to see Malignaggi playing musical chairs with Broner in fighting him over and over again, and disagreeing with the decision each time he loses to him. The fact that Malignaggi lost to Broner means he should get back in line and fight for the right to get another title shot at the belt.
I don’t consider Malignaggi’s win over a shot-looking Zab Judah as being enough to get Malignaggi another title shot. Judah is a light welterweight, not welterweight, and he was coming off of a loss to Danny Garcia. To get another title shot at the WBA belt, Malignaggi should have to face WBA interim 147 lb. champion Keith Thurman before he gets a crack at the title again. We can’t have Thurman bypassed by Malignaggi without getting his own shot, because Thurman earned his way to the #1 spot by beating previously undefeated Diego Chaves.
Golden Boy Promotions don’t seem to be in a big hurry to put Thurman in with Broner for some reason. It could be that they have some concern about whether Broner could handle the big punching Thurman. If that’s the case then they need to have Broner vacate the title because you can’t have a guy holding a belt that isn’t going to face the interim champion. Golden Boy needs to point Malignaggi towards Thurman so at least it’s fair to Thurman instead of Malignaggi getting an automatic rematch after beating a way past his past Judah.
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